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> LoL News, PBE News, Red Posts > Pool Party Graves, Leona, Lee Sin and Renekton on the PBE, IronStylus tells the story of Leona’s skin, Lucian Spotlight & Making Video, No more stealth for Rengar, State of Taric and Massive changes to Skarner!

Pool Party Graves, Leona, Lee Sin and Renekton on the PBE, IronStylus tells the story of Leona’s skin, Lucian Spotlight & Making Video, No more stealth for Rengar, State of Taric and Massive changes to Skarner!

This lovely interpretation of Pool Party Leona is the work of deviant artist Raichiyo33. You can find the original version there, along with a ton of other amazing LoL art!

Pool Party Graves, Leona, Lee Sin and Renekton are now available on the PBE for testing! IronStylus took the time to tell us how Leona‘s summer set came to be, Â Lucian has finally been shown in a Spotlight, along with another video showing an inside look at the development process, Scarizard ravages the remains of Rengar‘s kit in hopes that he can rise to power once more, short updates on Taric‘s current state, a list of changes coming to Skarner and the latest Rotation and Sale!

Four brand new skins have been released on the PBE in the spirit of summer!

“Summer’s come to Valoran, and Ziggs, duke of demolition, is throwing a blast of a pool party. Step one: blow up the inflatable pool toys. Hopefully he won’t misunderstand that one. Step two: invite friends! Leona’s here soaking up all the rays, no sunscreen required. Renekton’s on lifeguard duty, but he seems more worried about random explosions than anyone drowning. In the shallow end of the pool, Lee Sin happily studies the motion of the water with his hands while Graves, a sly grin curling across his lips, aims his watergun at the uncharacteristically oblivious monk. Leave it to Ziggs to create an explosive situation, this could get veryinteresting!

Welcome to Summer-ers Rift! Your invitation to the coolest dive in Valoran is coming soon.”

Pool Party Graves, Lee Sin, Leona and Renekton shown

Pool Party Graves

Pool Party Graves Splash

Pool Party Lee Sin

Pool Party Lee Sin Splash

Pool Party Leona

Pool Party Renekton

1) I did that design live, with a lot of feedback from the audience, and mentioned that it all could change. We did a few options, (bikini’s, pool noodles, one-piece suits, etc) However, it was known that all things may change. That particular concept, while fun to do live, and take live feedback/options, simply wasn’t the right fit for the game

2) Things always have to be adjusted and accounted for with game-angle in mind. That means, despite how the concept might have looked straight on, it means nothing if the in-game read is bad. I tried doing a 1-to-1 version of this skin in the 3/4s game view, it didn’t look good. Then I did one similar to what you see, but kept it pretty damn yellow, and it wasn’t enough. Once we added the blue trim, some other accents and materials, it popped and served what we’re all 100% focused on: the in-game read.

I understand the personal taste aspect, but believe me, I was a fan of the original, I was a fan of the intermediary, and I’m a big fan of how it came out.

(It’s also going to be super awesome to see done in cosplay!)

The sunglasses are also just for the recall, as a note.

Why were the summer skins delayed so much?

Â Â IronStylus:Â This was a ton of content, all done simultaneously. That means a LOT of time and resources. We’ve got some custom particles and animations, so that’s even more stuff to do. The Pool Party event was proposed.. I want to say.. not too long after we did the demo at PAX East. So, Beginning of April? That’s actually a TON of stuff to cram into that small of a window. So, no backup, just a lot of work on 5 simultaneous skins. That means concept/iteration, model/texture, animation, VFX, splash and more.

I’d say we did something really epic in a short amount of time considering!

Offtopic: Where is Scorched Earth Renekton?

Â Â IronStylus:Â To my knowledge, due to the Pool Party event popping up and the Life Guard Renekton skin being a fan-requested skin for so long, this seemed liked the perfect opportunity to switch things. Yes, SE Renekton is cool, but this was a really great opportunity to get something that people had wanted to see for a long time. Plus, it’s a silly skin. We’re desperately in need of those if you haven’t noticed ;D

What’s your skin release schedule?

Â Â IronStylus:Â Every champion needs skins, and every champion has a skin in development! Those that won’t be getting skins soon are those champions slated for Relaunch priority.

How many champions were considered for the Pool Party event?

Â Â IronStylus:Â A TON.

Here’s the good news about events/themes like this. They’re essentially infinite in how many champions the theme can be applied to. Every little easter egg that’s in the Pool Party Ziggs splash was considered, including more. You’ll note TONS of champions with the potential for Pool Party skins in the various splashes.

These are types of skin themes which are universal. Sometimes we might get carried away with certain ideas for “funny” or trolly skins that might be more specifically NA related, but these, in my opinion, strike the balance and are globally appealing. It’s a very universal and fun theme. And man.. there are SOOOO many options!

Why wasn’t Sivir chosen for a Pool party skin?

Â Â IronStylus:Â Sivir unfortunately won’t see another skin until her relaunch.

Learn to unleash a barrage of bullets and send opponents to the grave in the Lucian Champion Spotlight.

A highly-mobile ranged damage dealer, Lucian shines when blasting enemies with Piercing Light and quickly repositioning himself with Relentless Pursuit to unleash more pain or retreat from counterattacks and jungle ganks. By tagging enemies with Ardent Blaze and activating The Culling, Lucian gains the speed boost needed to chase down opponents, unload massive damage and secure kills. And since Lightslinger enables double on-hit procs of life steal, red buff and more, Lucian can overcome opponents in duels and in-lane trades with strategic use of his abilities.

Put evil in its place â€“ 6 feet under â€“ as Lucian with sample masteries, tactics and more in this Champion Spotlight.

But there are none! Scarizard‘s latest update on Rengar’s state is rather a series of trade-offs, posing the question whether this will help the League’s Predator. If you haven’t followed the discussion thus far, you can fill in on the gaps using the links below.Â

So, after some tests, the big changes i’ve made are pretty close to what i’d like to see in the final version. I’ll go through some of the core changes to my current changelist here, the reasoning behind it, and then update the main post with the differences as well.Â If i don’t make mention of a mechanic from Live or from my previous post in these updates, it means they haven’t changed.

Bonetooth Necklace

Grants 10 AD + 1 AD/Level

Recipe: Hunter’s Machete + Long Sword + 100g

PASSIVE: 20% Increased damage to monsters

3 Stacks: Rengar gains Flat Movement Speed while out of combat, or while in brush

Direction with Bonetooth as i’ve previously stated is to reduce the ‘Stat bonus’ focus on Bonetooth, and make it more Rengar-specific and use it as a tool to embrace and enhance Rengar’s stalking/hunting gameplay. Feedback on this direction has been going well and people are digging the direction, i’ll give my specific feelings about the bonuses.

3 Stacks – Enjoying how this is playing as an early-game reward that enables Rengar’s roaming, jungle or otherwise. Live Rengar has the Movement Speed bonus at Tier 2, idea is to move it to Tier 1 and make it less-permanent (Boots of Mobility) while being able retain the Flat MS while chasing targets through brush. Basically, ganking sidelanes and using the brush or fighting in the jungle keep Rengar speedy even if he’s flagged as in-combat.

6 Stacks – Really simple. *slightly* nerfed the leap range due to it moving to Tier 2 from Tier 3 and thus more accessible, but hitting this threshold really makes him ‘turn on’ in terms of midgame power. Liking this.

9 Stacks – Mostly placeholder, but i enjoy the effect. Likely could just add a bonus together with the increased duration to give a fixed power spike that Rengar can rely on for making it this far. Totally agree with any of you that this falls a little short on expectations especially at Tier 3. This is the only one i have less-than-high confidence for as a rewarding effect.

14 Stacks – This…is very powerful. Not only does it synergize with Rengar’s 3 stack for out of combat brush darting/chasing, this -also- means that Rengar has access to bonus movement speedÂ after leaping from brush. Haven’t gotten to this threshhold except for once, which when combo’d with the updates to Thrill of the Hunt that you’ll see below made for some -really- epic hunting experiences. Might tune this up, might slightly change, but this is the type of thing i want to see from Tier 4 Bonetooth.

Battle Roar ( W )

No Longer grants Armor/Magic Resistance

Enemies hit with Battle Roar have their Attack Damage reduced

If you’ve read my prior posts, you know my feelings about Battle Roar – specifically that it doesn’t especially informwhoÂ Rengar should be effective against, and thus just gives up a lump of power that’s hard to tune while remaining satisfying. Feedback from this thread also has been consistent that Battle Roar’s allure is Rengar imposing his will/intimidating opponents, not I AM LOUD AND TANKIER NOW.

Attack Damage reduction allows him to handle jungle minions pretty well, but also makes him a monster in fights vs champions that rely on basic attacks/physical damage abilities (like carries, or other fighters), while still keeping him vulnerable to magic damage abilities from tanks/mages. Overall, the goal is that if AD reduction can work out you can reach a spot where leaping onto Physical Damage dealers and roaring makes you feel more like you’re actively shutting down their damage potential rather than just being beefier than usual.Â Before you guys start biting my head off about how he won’t have the tankiness to survive , i totally see this as an opportunity to introduce better base stats if it shows that he desperately needs the durability.Â

Bola Strike ( E )

Is now a skillshot

Increased Range

Wav3break was always pushing for this and i was always pushing against it, but after having played around with it i really, really like it. Making E a skillshot allows the skill to generally have more power (Range, Damage, Effect are all vectors to tune, though i’d rather lean on the first two) – but also gives Rengar the feeling of ‘i have an option at all times’. Even when out of brush and in a siege situation, a traditional weakness of Rengar, the ability to harrass or create picks with Bola/Empowered Bola grants him more flexibility. Similarly, playing against feedback has been great (Got first blood with a jungle gank using Empowered E – felt like a boss landing the clutch shot, opponent felt it was much more fair due to being able to dodge).

In general, making Rengar’s pattern once he leaps on a target require more play/interplay and less guaranteed allows him to feel much better when he -does- succeed. This change has been trending well, but is something that we’ll be watching across future playtests to tune to appropriate power.

And for the big one:

Thrill of the Hunt ( R )

Cooldown decreased

No longer plays Voice Over or gives an Icon to enemies within Rengar’s sight/detection range

Consumes current Ferocity on cast – each point of Ferocity consumed increases the Duration of Thrill of the Hunt by 1 second.

No longer stealths Rengar for the duration

Duration greatly increased, scales with ult rank (personal note: ;_;)

Movement Speed increased

Rengar’s first basic attack while in Thrill of the Hunt will cause him to leap at his target – Rengar retains the Movement Speed increase from Thrill of the Hunt for 3 seconds after leaping.

So, we tried something crazy with the ultimate when concerns came about that the VO/Icon gameplay, while functional, was removing a lot of Rengar’s threat because people knew his gameplan. By taking -off- the stealth entirely and just overloading the parts of Rengar’s ult that people were appreciating (Ferocity Generation, Insane Mobility, True Vision) and let him have access to it more. Mid and end-game Rengar’s spend a majority of their time being predatory in nature, stalking brush and being opportunistic upon chasing down low-health targets post-fights – which is also made easier by giving him movement speed post-landing, allowing him to execute his Q-train combo/Bola strike without just failing to keep up to his prey. On the other end making Rengar’s gank + ult combo reliant on ‘brute forcing’ a gank ala Hecarim’s E or Rammus’ Powerball gives your opponent ways to play against it either by seeing them coming on wards and running or by otherwise predicting the gank paths a Rengar may take.

I agree that it sounds big…but the more we’ve played with it, the more people have realized the Stealth part of Thrill of the Hunt is perhaps the least-appreciated part. You still run insanely fast, you still leap. Removing Stealth also allows us to pull back slightly on some of the damage nerfs we’ve done to Rengar, as he telegraphs his intent very easily by being an insanely fast rocket cat.

(Bonus Round – To give you an idea of what we’re dealing with, Rengar withÂ no Boots, 14 Stack Bonetooth, Rank 3 Thrill of the Hunt and 5 Points of Ferocity can run from the bottom lane brush to the toplane’s river brush before the Ultimate’s duration times out, as long as you make clever use of all the brush in-between.

That’s with no boots. It’s pretty awesome to see.

So, be sure to let me know what y’all think about this version. When Rengar goes to PBE (SoonTM), this is likely very close to the one that i’ll throw up for players to mess around with. A lot of your feedback has helped a ton in shaping the versions of Rengar in testing and lot of the conversations we’ve been having, so don’t stop now!

Does the ultimate no longer generate Ferocity?

Â Â Scarizard:Â It still generates Ferocity. As i said before, if i didn’t mention it changing it stays the same – that’s the reason the ‘consuming’ ferocity on cast part exists to an extent. If you Ult with Rengar at 5 stacks sometimes it feels like you’re missing the Ferocity Generation part of the ultimate – so casting R with Ferocity stacks pre-built allows to you ‘Empower’ it by giving it more duration, and you’ll buyback the Ferocity anyways over the next few seconds.

Will we still have Predator Vision and the VO?

Â Â Scarizard:Â Unsure about getting the VO – Predator vision is staying the same as it is on live. In fact, increased duration means you get longer time in Infrared! My comments about removing VO/Icons is referring specifically to the VO/Icons that theÂ EnemyÂ would see when Rengar ulted in my previous iteration, not the ones Rengar himself sees currently on Live.

Â Is the Passive on Bonetooth Necklace unique?

Â Â Scarizard:Â At present, it’s a unique passive but doesn’t share the Maim/Butcher keyword like Wriggles or the Spirit Items, meaning you could very easily double-up on them if you so desired.

Isn’t the Bonetooth Necklace lacking in terms of stats?

Â Â Scarizard:Â Effects have been testing positively, would like to tweak the stats so that the item feels appropriately slot-efficient statwise, but not by too much – the vision for Rengar isn’t that this item is a ‘must-buy’ – it’s still a risk/reward item, but retuned so that the item itself is appealing to those who want to really embrace and play up Rengar’s identity as a hunter.

I’ll echo my previous post and say that i’m not super stoked about the Tier 3 as a standalone, but everything else feels really powerful/enabling for Rengar.

Â Won’t these changes hinder Rengar in a teamfight?

Â Â Scarizard:Â His damage itself hasn’t been reduced -that- much, it’s just spread out over a slightly longer period of time so that opponents have a greater time to react. If Rengar needs more damage, i’ll easily put more damage back on to the kit. In general though, damage dealers aren’t really expected to jump into the middle of 5 people, kill their target and then live. Rengar still has to be opportunistic, and his ultimate gives him a large window of time to capitalize on enemy mistakes and mispositioning, especially when fighting near Dragon/areas with a lot of brush.

We’ll be keeping an eye on his performance in teamfights (nothing out of the ordinary so far), but this is not a champion where you should expect to dive in alone to a team with no backup and carry out an assassination. When played appropriately however, you can really flank/control an area with the amount of mobility he has access to and kill people out of position one-by-one.

Suggestion: Bola Shot revealing the target hit

Â Â Scarizard:Â This is very scary – but has a lot of good feels from a flow perspective. Elise’s Cocoon and Syndra’s Stun both reveal targets hit so you can more easily follow-up your combos and dashes. It’s a change that would have a lot of cool play associated with it, but it’s unclear whether or not it’s good for the game overall. (this exact situation came up today where i really wanted to leap to the blue buff that i bola’d!) We’ll be having a lot of conversations on whether or not we should, but if it’s not too disruptive i’d like to!

Suggestion: Rengar generating FerocityÂ after he has leapedÂ during ult

Â Â Scarizard:Â Unlikely that we’d go with this – it doesn’t take very much time for him to generate his ferocity while in R, and the duration of it is so long already (12-18sÂ baseÂ currently, with the potential to get all the way up to 28 seconds!) that we really want you to relish the feeling of hunting and stalking, since you’ll have vision all this time. If you really need to Rocket-boost before your Fury is generated fully, it’s likely that it’s more important you make it to your target rather than have full ferocity when you get there (it’s also more likely you’ll still have a few points built up once you get there, so this hasn’t been a particular worry).

Have you tested these changes on Dominion?

Â Â Scarizard:Â Haven’t tested on Dominion, i’m afraid. We’re near the end of the ideation/exploration phases of Rengar, and once we’re confident in them will begin balance testing (where a lot of the number tuning takes place). At that time, it’s up to our resident ManWolfAxeBoss to decide how he’d like to handle Rengar with concerns to dominion.

Xelnath’s opinion on the rework

Â Â Xelnath:Â I was really skeptical about these changes. In particular, when I saw them on paper, I didn’t like the change to a skill-shot on E or the stealth removal on R.

… then at Scarizard and Wav3break’s insistence, I actually played it. It worked really well. I didn’t realize until after the game how little I missed the stealth. In fact, most cases where I would have used the stealth to escape – I could simply outrun the enemy.

Similarly, in cases where I would normally try to use my ult to stealth & run, but it would fail on live, due to never getting the “stealth” effect off, I occasionally survived.

The skillshot version actually made me a *better* player. People couldn’t vision juke me into brush – I bola shot them blindly. The skill shot also makes me more dangerous in ganks – the range is far better than on live.

I acknowledge the validity of your skepticism, but as a veteran Rengar player, I didn’t realize how little I appreciated the stealth until I was sprinting around the map without the need to use it.

How’s Taric holding up on bottom lane after the streak of hard nerfs in previous patches?

Â Scarizard:Â Probably not going to be able to stick around and monitor this, but since i have an opinion/some context, i thought i’d share with you my feels.

Taric is a (you guessed it) low counterplay champion. He kind of just gets in range and stuns you – and that’s about all there is. Statikk made a new passive in an attempt to add some gameplay to Taric around basic attacking/synergies with items and gold income, and it actually worked!

It also opened the door for Jungle Taric and Top Taric…which had to be nerfed due to his low counterplay overall. (one of the only cases we’ve had where after a nerf a champion’s winrate lowered but playrate spiked).

It’d be one thing if the champion just had low counterplay – there are plenty of examples of these in our game, namely amongst the Fighter class that are really fun and engaging, despite feeling bad for opponents. The issue is more that Taric is a lowÂ gameplayÂ champion overall – that is, there are very few actions Taric can take that make you feel powerful or skilled while expressing yourself.

Taric is certainly powerful – and when he was powerful, people played him to no end because of it. Stun on a stick, tons of free stats for your allies and a heal? What’s not to like? Well, a lot as it turns out. Leona calls sunrays to crash atop your foes and leaps across the battle with a beamsword. Nami smacks everyone with a tidal wave and bubbles dudes. Thresh. (The entire champion. That’s the sentence.)
Taric can, and always has been able to stand up to these dudes in power, but there’s a definite lack in expression and realized fantasy that i think make him seem far worse off than he actually is.

What this means, is in his current state he won’t get worse – but he ain’t gettin’ better. We’d need to do some deeper refactoring on Taric to find ways to add more actual counterplay/gameplay in his kit, and hopefully get him feeling like that playmaking/hero support (Even Alistar/Soraka, lesser played supports have these epic moments of feeling like you’re moving mountains for your teammates) – no timeline on when that would ever come out, or how many resources we’d need – although it’s certainly something that would be cool for someone to undertake in sync with maybe a Visual Update if we have bandwidth for a project in the future (Currently, Live is dealing with Rengar, Xerath, Olaf, Heimerdinger, and all of our new champions – not to mention the patch to patch balance as-is). This isn’t saying it wouldn’t get done. I’d just say it’s on the further end of our Radar, and as things move up the more likely we’ll be able to revisit him.

Â RiotScruffy:Â Hey all. This thread has been so incredibly helpful, you all have been having huge impact on this Skarner rework so far. We are getting more and more happy with each new version and I wanted to provide an update of where we are at. Skarner feels like a much more reliable pick with these changes, and I think he will gain a lot of his old glory back when you all have a chance to play him.

Overall, his ability to engage in ganks, mid game skirmishes, and late game team fights is increased. He is still able to brawl and 1v1 very well and his jungle clear times are slightly improved. The E is an essential part of his kit now, and it has opened up a lot of interesting new plays that Skarner can make. One of the most important things is that, for us old Skarner players, he still feels like the Skarner we know and love.

Full changelist:

Â Â Skarner

Base Attack speed lowered by 1%

Crystal Slash ( Q )

Mana cost reduced from 20/22/24/26/28 to 16/18/20/22/24

When target is hit, Skarner gains a 4/5/6/7/8% Attack Speed buff for 6 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times.

Slow removed (moved to E)

Crystaline Exoskeleton ( W )

Attack speed component removed (moved to Q)

Cooldown lowered from 18 to 14 seconds

Max movepseed increasedÂ from 15/17/19/21/23%Â to 24/28/32/36/40% and ramps up over 3s

Duration remains at 6 seconds

Shield value increased from 70/115/160/205/250 to 75/125/175/225/280

Shield AP ratio increased from 0.6 to 0.8

Fracture ( E )

Mana cost reduced from 50/55/60/65/70 to 40/45/50/55/60

Heal removed (power moved into W shield)

Targets hit are slowed by 30/35/40/45/50% for 2.5 seconds

Missile range increased from 800 to 1000

Missile width reducedÂ from 120 to 90

Missile speed reducedÂ from 1800 to 1700

Impale ( R )

Impale now roots targeted champion during the windup animation

These are still very much work in progress, and I still want your input on how you feel about these changes. I will also keep coming back to fill you all in on how these changes feel in internal playtesting.

Â How does the MS bonus from W ramp up?

Â RiotScruffy:Â Right now it ramps up from 20% lower than the max movespeed over the 3s. Also, it updates every 0.25s, but your math is correct for the assumptions you made.

How will Skarner hold up in lane?

Â RiotScruffy:Â Laning Skarner is a consideration that we’ve had and he’s still as viable if not more than he was before. Being able to stack up the attack speed buff on Q makes you a very strong duelist. He makes up for his loss in sustain in other new ways. He wont be one of the most popular solo laners but he isn’t totally unviable.

Why was the slow removed from his Q?

Â RiotScruffy: I’ll clarify because this is in many people’s opinions the most significant loss to his kit. There are a few major gains to the new slow pattern compared to the old.

-Skarner is still able to get to and stick with a target. This is key to Skarner’s ability to play the game (as a melee) and we definitely would not remove this from him.

-Targets are not slowed permanently without any means of escape. The new slow will give him about 50% slow uptime without much cooldown reduction. This allows for both Skarner and his target to make meaningful plays. A target with a moveblock has to be smart about using it or Skarner will be able to reapply slow or catch up. Skarner players can also be smart about coordinating their slow with other CC from their team or even with a slow->ult->slow combo by themselves.

-The new slow application has more interest for both Skarner and the target. The slow on a line skillshot nuke adds a lot of thought/skill to Skarner play and feels really good to hit. New opportunities of when and how to use the slow are opened up and it gives the needed variety to his kit. Skarner is taking some risk to cast the slow, but if he lands the skillshot there is an appropriate reward.

From the many people internally that we have had playtest the new Skarner, they all seem to agree that this pattern is more interesting and fun. I hope you feel the same way when you have the chance to play him.